Wednesday, June 11, 2008

The non-toddling toddler

Buddy is one year, one week and one day old - and yet he does not walk. Only in the past few days has he done the finger grabbing, hand-holding frog march thing with any skill.

At the weekend, we went to the playground and twin girls who were about his size were taking stumbling steps. Before they arrived, he'd been crawling happily but after seeing them he pretended to walk by gamely holding onto the hand holds of the climbing frame/ slide thingy. What a poser. I guess peer pressure starts young.

I'm don't really worry about it, when he's ready, he's ready. But the Vol-in-Law wants him to walk. He calls him the non-toddling toddler. He sat up pretty early, creeped and crawled pretty early, too. The ViL says "I don't want to be parent who says 'Some babies don't walk until they're sixteen months old. ' I want to be the parent who says 'Yeah, he's walking.'"

5 comments:

jen said...

Ha! Well my niece skipped the whole crawling thing altogether. Went from sitting around, to full on running at 14 months...

So there's no predicting I guess!

Anonymous said...

First son: Paediatrician said, when I brought him in 16 months not yet wallking, "He's fine. Come back if he's not walking by 18 months, and then I'll refer you to a specialist to do some testing, but I promise you, thanks to all the other signs I see, he'll be walking by then." So when did he start? At 17 months, three weeks, I kid you not. Those last couple weeks gave me a few gray hairs. Now he's nine and a half years old and a fantastic swimmer -- but he's not too into anything that involves running. Perhaps the incessant heat of Bangkok dissuades him.

Second son: Started walking at 14 months. At nearly six years old, he loves football (both kinds) and jumping on the trampoline.

Your Buddy is so cute! When he starts walking and running, part of you might sometimes miss the days when he was more easily "containable" in public or non-child-friendly areas. As a full-on toddler he'll keep you even more on your toes! :)

Anonymous said...

The good news is...early crawlers don't need to walk. They have already mastered a means of locomotion. The bad news, there isn't any. Bag that he sets land speed records for 1 year 1 month 1 day olds and take solace ion the fact that his hand prints can be found only a few inches above the floor.

Soon, all to soon he will want he car keys
Volpa

Anonymous said...

Already his hand prints are way up the wall. They will soon be all over. I saw walking progress while I was there. You walked on your first birthday. VolBro was a little longer in walking -- I think 14 months. But he had you to get him where he couldn't crawl fast enough. He is, unbiasedly, a precious, fast child whom you will always have a hard time keeping track. Patience. VolMom

Katie said...

One of mine walked at 11 months, one the week he turned 12 months and one the week he turned 13 months. My niece didn't walk tl 15 months, and my next door neighbor didn't walk until 17 months.

Charlotte is 10 months and is just now crawling - sort of. But she pulls up and sort of stumble walks between two close-together objects. I suspect she'll walk at about 12 -13 months. I look forward to it, as my back is killing me.

She still has nary a tooth, however.